Latest education updates from around the world
Checkology Enhances Students Media and News Literacy
Scammers are Unforgiving on Student Loan Relief
Great news for student borrowers everywhere: the White House has announced a plan for student loan relief. There are currently 45 million borrowers in the U.S. with debt totaling over $1.6 trillion. Many borrowers are rejoicing at this news, and unfortunately, so are cybercriminals who see a new opportunity to exploit consumers. The Federal Trade Commission previously issued a warning about student loan scams because of the uptick in loan forgiveness scams during the pandemic and moratorium on payments.
Now that a student loan relief program has arrived, Lookout, the leader in delivering integrated […]
Best Apps for Researchers and Graduate Students
1. Note taking apps
Why Our Voices Sounds Different to Us Than to Others
“do I really sound like that?” is a question that you will hear many students ask the first they hear themselves on an audio recording.
How to Create Your Own Search Engine
A couple of weeks ago I published a post about two ways to add an image search tool to your website. One of those methods is to build your own search engine. Thanks to Google’s Programmable Search tool it’s much easier to create your own search engine than you might think it is. In the short video embedded below I demonstrate how to create your own search engine.
Applications for Education
Creating your own small search tool can be helpful when you are introducing younger students to web search strategies. By making your […]
Pizza, Cats, and Videos – The Week in Review
Good morning from Maine where we’re going to enjoy a nice long weekend of riding our bikes, raking some leaves, and visiting Storyland one last time before it closes for the winter. I hope that you have a great weekend!
If your weekend plans include catching up on some ed tech news, take a look at the list of this week’s most popular posts.
These were the week’s most popular posts:
1. Tutorials for Getting Started With the Smithsonian Learning Lab
2. The Science of Pizza, Diets, and the Esophagus
3.
Short Lessons on the Differences Between Canadian and American Thanksgiving
Monday is Thanksgiving Day in Canada. It’s about six weeks earlier than it is here in the United States. I’ve celebrated both versions of Thanksgiving and I can tell you that there are a lot of similarities between the two. There are also some differences between them. The following videos provide a humorous look at the similarities and differences between American Thanksgiving and Canadian Thanksgiving.
Reminder! You should always preview videos before showing them in your classroom. I know many high school teachers who will not have a problem sharing these, but teachers of younger students […]
Breaking News Generator- A Great Tool to Use to Enhance Students Media Literacy
Quest v46 Update Brings ‘Lord of the Rings’ Home Area, Recent Apps Tab & More
Meta is getting ready to roll out Quest’s v46 update ahead of its Connect 2022 developer conference next week, bringing to the platform a modest set of new features alongside a new Home environment inspired by The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.
It’s only been a little over two weeks since Meta announced it was rolling out v44, which included a bunch of capture settings to make in-game video recordings better for the average user. Now, skipping over v45, Meta says it has a few things in store ahead of Connect.
When it rolls out, […]
What is Classcraft and How Can It Be Used to Teach? Tips & Tricks
Classcraft gamifies the social and emotional needs of students with a hint of adventure for extra fun.
Eight Good Tools for Creating and Publishing Timelines
Having students create timelines has been a standard in the playbooks of history teachers since the beginning of history. Writing a timeline is a good way for students to chronologically summarize sequences of events and see how the events are connected. When I was a student and when I started teaching timelines were made on large pieces of paper. For someone with handwriting like mine and a keen interest in history, there was never enough room on even the largest paper to make the timeline look nice. Today’s students can make timelines online and not have […]
Brief Explanations of Indigenous Peoples’ Day and Why Some States No Longer Have Columbus Day
Monday is Indigenous Peoples’ Day here in Maine. In other states it is still referred to as Columbus Day. The Daily Bellringer offers a good video that explains the history of Columbus Day and why some cities and states are now celebrating Indigenous Peoples’ Day instead. Watch the video on YouTube and open the description to find a set of discussion questions to ask your students.
The 8 Elements of Critical Thinking
What Is Critical Thinking? A Great Video Lesson for Students
10 Great TED Ed Lessons on Critical Thinking to Use with Students
Examples of Critical Thinking Questions for Students
Fun Math Games to Help Students Practice Math Concepts and Skills
We all know that games and fun learning activities are more conducive to meaningful learning experiences and a higher level of students engagement and participation. This is even so with subjects that are notoriously known for being dry and boring such as math.
In this post, I share with you a wide variety of resources where you can search for and find fun math games to use with your students in and out of class. These games are ideal for students in different grades from preschool to grade 8. They also cover various math skills […]
HTC Teases Next VR Headset Ahead of Meta Connect & It’s Supposed to Be Small
HTC today teased what’s confirmed to be the company’s next VR headset, something the Vive-creator says will be “something big… we mean small.”
There’s not much to go on for now, only a tweet which shows a piece of the headset in question with the subtitle “Go small or go home.” No name, no price, no release window. Bupkis.
Go small or go home. pic.twitter.com/PUqqKn4V5E
— HTC VIVE (@htcvive) October 6, 2022
Is it an image of a pancake lens, which many VR headset creators like Meta and Lenovo are now using in place of traditional Fresnel lenses to lower […]
‘Beat Saber’ Gets Lizzo Music Pack Today (and it’s about damn time)
VR’s favorite block-slashing rhythm game Beat Saber (2018) is getting its first Lizzo music pack today, featuring nine songs from the Grammy-winning artist that are sure to get you up and dancing.
The new Lizzo Beat Saber Music Pack is set to drop today on all supported platforms, priced at $12 for the whole nine-song pack, or $2 per song. You’ll find it over on Quest, Rift, Steam and PSVR.
Here’s a look at the track list, which spans EP Coconut Oil (2016), and albums Cuz I Love You […]
Alleged Quest Pro Leak Shows Meta’s Next-gen Headset in Action
Immersed, a startup known for its work-focused productivity app for VR, may have jumped the gun a little early, as the company posted a short clip of what appears to be Meta’s upcoming Project Cambria mixed reality headset (aka ‘Quest Pro’).
The video, spotted in a company blogpost, appears to be demonstrating the Immersed app in action on the unreleased Quest Pro, making use of its hand tracking and mixed reality capabilities.
Here’s a copy of the GIF, which has since been removed from the post:
First putting on a Quest Pro headset, the clip […]
What Is a Metaversity? What You Need to Know
A metaversity may be part of the next wave of Metaverse-education. Here’s what you need to know.
Three Student Video Contests
Video creation contests can be a fun way to get students thinking about academic topics and then producing videos to demonstrate their understanding of those topics. This fall I’ve written blog posts featuring three different video contests for students. A summary of all three is included below.
Economic Education Video Contest
The Council for Economics Education is hosting a student video contest to promote student awareness of how economics is a part of their daily lives.
The contest is open to students and teachers in the United States in Kindergarten through twelfth grade. To participate students and teachers […]
Everything You Need to Know About Computer Monitors
Back when I taught computer repair we got all kinds of old computers and monitors donated to our classroom. One of the seemingly never-ending challenges was matching monitors with computers. That was particularly true when my students would be confronted by units that had only VGA or DVI inputs. And there was always an conversation that included phrases like “this monitor is so old” and “can this monitor work with this input?” All that to say, I ended up spending time at the start of the course explaining various monitors and connections. I wish I had […]
Meta’s First Step Toward a Proper Metaverse: Avatars That Can “travel between” Two Platforms
Meta says it plans to connect Horizon Worlds and Crayta in ‘meaningful ways’ which will bring the first inkling of cross-platform interoperability to the company’s metaverse plans.
Meta may be all in on the metaverse, but to date hasn’t done much to actually build one. Sure, the company has Horizon Worlds, which is no doubt a great collaborative creation platform, but it’s an island unto itself with no interoperability outside of its own walls—something which many agree is a requirement for a proper metaverse. But soon, Meta says, it will take its first step—a tiny step—toward an interconnected metaverse.
At the upcoming […]
Unofficial ‘Half-Life’ VR Mod is Coming to Steam October 20th
Much like the recently released Half-Life 2 VR Mod, Valve is soon giving its blessings to another third-party project that this time brings VR support to the original Half-Life (1998).
If you’ve played Half-Life in VR before, it was probably thanks to the HLVR mod by Max Vollmer, who started back in 2017 to bring Valve’s iconic action-adventure shooter to the first wave of consumer VR headsets.
Now Vollmer is getting ready to launch HLVR on Steam starting October 20th. The mod is free, however it of course requires you to own a copy of Half-Life to play (i.e. […]